“Terminator 6” failure: James Cameron blames himself (and Arnold Schwarzenegger’s involvement)

James Cameron is actually on a big interview tour for “Avatar 2: The Way Of Water”. But he was now from the trade journal also asked about “Terminator: Dark Fate”. The sixth part of the series should actually be linked to the original James Cameron classic. Although Deadpool creator Tim Miller directed, Cameron was heavily involved in the project. It has been known for some time that there was a fight between the two men. Cameron, meanwhile, looks back on the film quite forgivingly and is above all very self-critical.

He is still friends with Miller, even though there was a lot of banging during the movie. With “Terminator 6: Dark Fate” as a movie, he was also “halfway happy”. On the other hand, he sees it as his fault that the sequel flopped at the box office, where it only grossed $261 million worldwide on a pure production budget of $185 million.

Insisted Schwarzenegger: “Terminator 6” was so grandpa cinema!

“I think the problem was, and I take my hat off to that, that I refused to do it without Arnold [Schwarzenegger] to do,” explains Cameron. Tim Miller wanted to do without Arnold Schwarzenegger and envisioned an approach without the icon. But Cameron explains that he and Schwarzenegger have been friends for 40 years and if he had made the film without him, he would have heard Schwarzenegger’s criticisms in his head. So he insisted that Miller and his team find a way to include Schwarzenegger.

» “Terminator: Dark Fate” on Disney+*

Because Tim Miller wanted to bring Linda Hamilton back, there was the problem of having two old stars in lead roles. According to him, “Terminator 6” could have been successful with Hamilton alone or Schwarzenegger alone, but with both together it was no longer a “Terminator” movie for the current generation. It wasn’t even a ‘Terminator’ movie for their dads: “It was your grandfather’s ‘Terminator’ movie,” Cameron said self-critically .

So he had to do without Schwarzenegger. Not seeing that is the mistake. You loved the idea, thought the movie was cool, and maybe you were just too intoxicated to make it happen.

James Cameron, Arnold Schwarzenegger and more as subjects in the Love of the Screen podcast

That Cameron found it so difficult to make a “Terminator” movie without his good friend Arnold Schwarzenegger is certainly due to their shared history with the series. Cameron never really wanted Schwarzenegger for the very first movie “The Terminator” from 1984 – and the Austrian superstar herself actually wanted to play a completely different role.

How their collaboration came about during a meeting now considered legendary is one of the many anecdotes we tell about James Cameron in our Love on the Screen podcast. In addition, of course, we also talk about the work of the “Avatars” creator and rank his films:

“Avatar 2: The way of the water“You can now see it in German cinemas.